


The Privilege of Being Outlived

by SensationalSunburst



Series: PawPaw!Cor [3]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Cor is BEST, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Post Dawn, Post Game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-29
Updated: 2017-06-28
Packaged: 2018-11-06 05:31:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11029644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SensationalSunburst/pseuds/SensationalSunburst
Summary: “Therefore, I must request that you and Cindy and Talcott allow me the privilege of being outlived. I beg you to outlive me.”ORThe Stages of Grief by Cor Leonis





	1. Chapter 1

Iris Amicitia was no stranger to grief. She’d been taught to funnel it into how she fought, to use it as fuel, to never let it hinder her by allowing it to fester.

She’d seen her brother cry only twice. Once, several weeks after Mom had died, and he’d broken their mother’s cardinal rule by attempting to bury his pain under anger. He’d tried to funnel grief into rage and use to fight, but anger and grief are not the same, even if they feel similar. In the end, it was her father that finally cracked him open, easing out the pain by Amicitia tradition; on the training mat. She’d been spying, watching as her father took Gladdy down again, and again, letting him work himself up into a fine rage until her father had suddenly dropped his practice sword and hauled her brother into his arms. There’d only been a moment of resistance, her father offering soft words she’d hadn’t been able to hear before Gladio had burst into hysterical tears.

He’d cried himself to sleep.

The second time, again, she’d been spying. Waiting for the three broken men that Areana had dropped off in Lestallem, shell shocked and silent, to acknowledge the loss of their King to a divine force that may or may not ever give him back. She’s stayed just long enough to watch Prompto dissolve into tears, crushed between Gladio and Ignis. When their shoulders began to shake in earnest, she’d snuck away and left them to their own, unique grief.

She only ever saw Cor Leonis cry once.

In the days after the Dawn, they’d all been busy. But despite her best efforts, she’d been unable to go more than two hours without choking on the realization that they were gone. That they were _all_ gone.

Cor, however was a whirlwind, barking orders, fielding questions, delegating what he couldn’t do himself to anyone willing to take on the work load. But he stopped dead for her every time, dropped everything when he’d find her or Talcott or Cindy shivering in a hallway, in a corner, frozen in grief’s frigid grip in the front seat of Talcott’s truck. He offered no platitudes, no apologies. Just a solid, warm hug, a firm hand on a shoulder and blissful, understanding silence.

Monica had tried to help, tried to shift some of the weight from Cor’s shoulders, but still, every night, he was the one ushering her out to rest under half hearted threats and inside jokes. And every morning, he’d be the first one you’d see in their impromptu HQ at Takka’s, the bruises under his eyes as heavy and dark as ever as he readied the tasking for the day.  

He was a tank.

He was on the ground with the first teams to clear the road into Insomnia, hauling debris and rubble that a man of his age should truly have left to his younger companions. He oversaw  early morning meetings, greeting dignitaries and heads of state as Aranea , fierce, dutiful Aranea shuttled them back and forth across the world. He orchestrated late night raids, clearing out beasts that had taken refuge in the cracks and ruins of the city and he did it all stoically. No anger, no attitude, no sudden raging against the sky and the Astrals like one poor hunter had.

(Cor had talked him down as well, calmly taken the keys from his white knuckled grip. Walked the man to a corner and allowed him to scream and sob about his son. His son who died just _days_ before the Dawn broke.)

The delegation from Tenebrae brought them all Sylleblossms, great beautiful blooms in small shining black pots, engraved with the Lucian crest. Ship loads of flowers to honor the fallen. For Lady Lunafreya, they were told, loved the flowers so and it was her love for the world that they wished to spread. The gratitude they knew she would have for them and their hard work was supposedly wrapped up in each little petal of those brilliant blue flowers.

Iris had fallen easily back into her court training, she knew what to say, how to smile, how to move. And as Cor had accepted his obsidian pot at the ceremony, held on the broken steps of the Citadel, she’d watched his face tighten just so as he reached a single finger up to trace along the stem.  

And then Monica was gone, and Cor held two little pots of Sylleblossms.

Monica, Cor declared, wasn’t a huge fan of the sea. She wasn’t a great swimmer. She, he said, would prefer to be buried in the forest, and so they did. They put her to rest in the shade of a tall pine, overlooking a lake in the heart of Duscae.

One day, shortly after, there were three little pots in his windowsill, but Iris didn’t have the heart to ask who it had been.

Months passed. A small portion of the city had been cleared of rubble and was still in no way habitable, but it was progress, and so it was to be celebrated. There were new treaties in place, strange agreements because there still wasn’t exactly a ruling party yet. The plans for the Dawn Festival were set, done just before Monica passed. And so Takka and a number of over eager hunters prepared a feast for them all at the Quay. It was smaller, friendlier than the Hammerhead station; rebuilt nearly immediately as a testament to the return of normalcy, or some semblance of it.  

“Where’s Cor?” Cindy asked, putting out another tray of skewers. Ignis’s recipe, recovered from their last campsite after the Dawn broke. The boys had left everything behind, except Prompto, who’d carried his camera and photos into the city with him. Gladio’s novels, rare in the Dark, stacked neatly beside the rest of his clothes. A note tucked away in his pocket where he knew Iris was going to look.

Ignis’s glasses, his actual glasses, not the sunglasses he’d taken to wearing. His journals, all of them, covered from cover to cover to with recipes, little notes and changes squeezed into the margins and a forward obviously transcribed by Prompto apologizing if his handwriting was difficult to read.

(“Inspiration,” Read the note, “Tended to strike at rather inopportune moments, but to ignore the light bulb of creativity would be to lose the thought to the darkness of battle forever.” )

Prompto made a point of owning as little as possible. The only traces he left behind in the tent were his clothes, bunched up in a heap in the corner.

Noctis had left nothing.

“I dunno.” Iris shrugged, looking over the crowd. They were all boxed in between the massive lights, borrowed from Lestallum, wary of the darkness still, but under the glow of the lamps people were smiling, laughing. Some were even dancing, but Cor was nowhere to be found.

“I think he… went up to see them.” Talcott said, stepping around the buffet table.

Iris looked up then, out at the cliff face overlooking the Haven and the resort and saw a small light against the brilliance of the stars. She quirked her lip to the side and sighed.

“I’ll go check on him. Be right back.”

                                -----

They’d had buried them all in a row  overlooking the Quay. Facing out over the water so that the morning sun would shine evenly over their smooth black headstones. There were fresh sylleblooms in the golden vases at the base of each stone, and she found Cor nestled between Noctis and Gladio, leaning against the side of her brother’s headstone as if he’d been buried along with them. On the hill above the four, they’d placed a headstone for her father and King Regis, their bodies weren’t recovered, but they’d buried her father’s sword and that almost was good enough.

In the moonlight, Cor looked like a ghost, the circles under his eyes almost black. His eyes were closed, and if it hadn’t been for the way he was dancing his fingers back and forth across the label of his beer, she would have thought he was dead as well. At once, she felt as if she was intruding, like she had walked in on a private conversation. Especially as Cor tilted his face towards the sound of her footsteps and she spotted silver track lines of tears on his cheeks.

She paused, her throat tightening at the sight, and tried to decide if she should leave him be or speak.

“Once,” He said, deciding for her, “Your father yelled at me for ‘endangering our company’ because I was bottling my emotions.” He opened his eyes, and another tear escaped to wind its way past the crow’s feat at his eyes, down through the inky swell of his under-eye and down his face. He made no move to wipe it away.

“I’d killed my first man not a week before. Thought I’d handled it, I’d cleaned my blade. Washed my hands. But he could see the strain it put on my fighting style. He said I was hesitating. I was so angry, but I knew he was right. As you and I both know, he usually was.”  Cor rolled the bottle between his palms, and motioned that Iris was welcome to join him. She sat at his feet and just off to the side, careful to both avoid sitting on Gladio’s legs and blocking Cor’s view of the waves lapping against the beach.

“They were all usually right, which is the worst thing about the entire situation. I wanted Cid to be wrong, I _prayed_ for it. Not that the Astrals give a fuck about us. He sat there, before your father had even imagined your mom in his wildest dreams, and told me that I’d outlive them all. And I did. _All_ of them.” A strangled noise attempt to escape his throat, but he cut it off before it made it past his lips.

“ _All of them._ ” He repeated, waving a hand at the headstones above him and the ones he was sitting amongst. He pointed up and to the left, towards Duscae and where Cid and Monica were buried.“

"Gods, it’s _bullshit_.” He sighed, suddenly exhausted, and slumped to thunked his head against Gladio’s headstone.

Iris didn’t know what to say, or even if there was anything to say. Instead, she got up and resettled next to Cor, easily slipping to sit next to Noctis’s stone, leaned her head against Cor’s shoulder and reached out to grab his free hand. Cor sighed heavily, and tilted his head away from the headstone to rest it on top of Iris’s.

“Therefore, I must request that you and Cindy and Talcott allow me the privilege of being outlived. I _beg_ you to outlive me.” There was a heavy tilt to his words, and they sound choked to her ears, but she couldn’t look. Not when her own eyes are suddenly swimming with tears.

“I think I can do that, old man.”

“See to it that you do, kid. See to it that you do.”


	2. Gladio's Note

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At their final campsite, tucked away in Gladio's pocket, Iris found a note.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I thought this was a one shot too, but here we are. 
> 
> Enjoy :D

~~Hey brat,~~

~~Sis,~~

 

Iris,

 

I'm sorry that it happened like this, I wish we had more time. But duty calls. I know you'll understand why we couldn't wait and why I couldn't let you come.

 

Ignis told me to give you his love, Prompto and Noctis do too, even though they’re asleep, curled up like puppies like they're kids again.

 

I wish you could have seen Noct, he looks like a real King now, even though his beard is ridiculous. Yeah, _almost_ as bad as Prom’s.

 

I love you so much, Iris.

~~I'm gonna miss you~~

 

I would have given anything to spare you this life, the darkness and the loss. I'm Noct's shield by duty, but I'm yours by birth and I regret that I couldn’t protect you from any of this. This isn't the life you deserve, but I know you're going to do so well regardless. I’m so proud of you. I know mom and dad are too. Iris the Demonslayer has a different kind of ring to it than Princess Iris, right?

 

Not that you'd be any less of a handful as a princess than you are now.

 

I remember when you were little and Mom had bought you a little crown, it was modeled after the Queen's and it was way too big for you but you wore it constantly. You broke three of them, but Mom replaced them when you were sleeping so you never even knew. I was your knight back then, back when you had pink _everything_ and Dad use to pick you up and and do curls with you, do you remember? Gods, you laughed so hard I was afraid you were going to pass out.  

 

Either way, you'll always be my little princess.

 

I have a favor to ask of you, my last one, I promise. Look after Cor. It may seem obvious to you, you've always been so perceptive, but he's going to need you, he just doesn't know it yet. When this is all over he needs someone to protect, to keep him going. ~~I know, you don’t need anyone to protect you~~  We're a lot alike in that regard. I'm afraid he's just going to fade away without it. Enlist Talcott and Cindy too; keep that old man busy.

 

Take care of yourself. Have fun, be safe, make good choices. Wear sunscreen.

 

I love you.

 

~~Goodbye~~

Until next time,

 

Gladdy

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> <3 
> 
> Cor struck me as a pretty level headed man, and for me that means he's learned the value of handling your emotions. 
> 
> He's also just me favorite.


End file.
